Thursday, April 26, 2007

It was the old British prime minister, Harold Wilson, who said ‘A week is a long time in politics’: he should have come to Poland.

It’s all been going off here.

Police raided the house of ex-construction minister in the previous SLD government, Barbara Blida, investigating allegations she had been involved in corruption when allocating building contracts. Blida went to the toilet, accompanied by a female police officer, when, somehow, she put a hand in a drawer in the bathroom, pulled out a gun and shot herself dead through the chest.

What had she been up to as minister of construction in that sleaze ridden, ex-communist government? How was she allowed to get hold of a gun when under police supervision? What was a gun doing in her bathroom in the first place?

Jurek and church

Only a few days ago, Marek Jurek announced, with a flourish, that he was resigning the powerful position of Speaker of Parliament, leaving the government and leaving the ruling Law and Justice party (see previous post)to set up his own party – the Polish Right.

Quite apart from the fact that Jurek’s Polish Right would not be ‘Right’ at all – it would be much the same as the current government: a conservative leftish party (a marriage made in hell) – we already have one of those nationalist-conservative grouping: the barmy League of Polish Families.

So the ‘right’ looked set to split and split again, and so split the ‘right’ vote in the process.

But now the talk is of Jurek rejoining Law and Justice. Maybe. But maybe not.

A week is a long time in the politics of Marek Jurek. But what has changed his mind and tempted him back with his old mates?

Cue – stage right – the entry of the good old Polish Catholic Church, which has been trying to mediate between Jurek and the Kaczynski government. Why? Because the church does not want further splintering of the rightwing (read ‘conservative-left) in Poland in case the real Left or secular liberals get in power.

That the Church thinks it has a role in Polish politics is a scandal. If Jurek does come back then I think quite a few Poles will vote in a way that will make the cardinals cry into their pulpits.

How to become exempt from lustration in Poland?

Become a Catholic.

I have had to go through the ‘auto-lustration’ process. Everyone who works in the media here, and born before 1972, has to sign a form saying that he, ''Is not aware or conscious of the fact that he worked for the Polish communist secret service.’

Me, a root vegetable from south London, a Polish communist spy?

I spent most of the 1980s half conscious in some university student bar near the Elephant and Castle.. So how would I know if, unaware to myself, the conscious half of my brain had been spying for the Polish communists, or any other communists, for that matter?

I signed this nonsense. I would have gotten in trouble, and my boss would have gotten in bigger trouble, if I had not. So I did.

But it appears that employees of anything to do with the Polish Catholic Church are exempt from the lustration process, because of the Concordat signed between the Vatican and the Polish state.

So the government thinks that I am a greater potential threat to Poland than some Polish Catholic university lecturer.

A week is not just a long time in Polish politics, it's a very weird week, as well.

51 comments:

PiS was essentially a conglomerate of two parties : PC (Kaczynski's party) and ZChN (the Christian-National Union, Zjednoczenie Chrześcijańsko-Narodowe; and yes it means exactly what you think). So now the ZChN fraction led by Jurek has split off PC.

"That the Church thinks it has a role in Polish politics is a scandal"

Well considering that Polish usage favors the Italian meaning of scandal (uproar in the theater) rather than the English meaning (better covered by 'afera' in Polish) I'll agree.

I actually think the church as a political institution has every right to be involved in Polish politics. But then, it should also be taxed and regulated like the political organization it is.If it doesn't want to play by the rules governing political entities it needs to concentrate on people's spiritual needs and not political maneuvering.

MichaelI actually think the church as a political institution has every right to be involved in Polish politics.

As an ‘interest group’, then of course they have the right to lobby government. But the church is not a normal pressure group – it is not based on normal, secular principles…it’s a religion!....so to act as a politically partisan group, with an influence in 2007 that is much weaker, in the population, than that of 20 years ago (no more communists) ….is a scandal (all linguistic means).

Polish political parties are not a Party, at all – they are coalitions about as as stable as the nuclei inside uranium

This is a surprisingly good model. Here's why:

1. Unstable nuclei are described by their half-life time, i.e. time by which 50% of the nuclei will by itself decay turning into another element. Observation suggests that Polish political parties follow similar path, i.e. they spontaneously breakup and turn into different entitities with different properties. Estimation of half-life time of a Polish political party is left to the reader. Note however, that natural uranium is a mix of U235 and U238, which have half life times of 700 million and 4.4 billion years, respectively, so in comparison, uranium is an example of stability...

2. Products of fission of a single nuclei (neutrons, specifically) can cause fission of multiple another nuclei. If enough fissionable material is contained within a sufficiently small space, a chain reaction can occur. Similarly, political conflicts arise when the politicias are confined within a small space (i.e. the parliament) and small conflicts have been known to cause large breakups.

3. Nuclear fission releases large amounts of enery. Party breakup relases large amounts of hot air.

4. The model suggests that confining enough politicians in a sufficiently small space should cause a runaway party breakup chain reaction, leading to an explosive release of energy...

OpampI think we are close to a fission theory of POlish politics. It's the Opamp-Beatroot Hypothesis.

But we have to remember that as mass is turned to energy, as Polish politicians get squeezed into ever decreasing amounts of space (or even five minutes stuck in a lift with each other would do it) great showers of destructive energy is released (causing burning and DNA degeneration to all those unlucky to be in its path) then less mass is the result. Put four hydrogen nuclei together and you get gaseous helium – but it doesn’t add up to a mass of 4. It’s more like 3.3 (the rest being turned to energy).

The classic rightwing, conservative party in Poland is Civic Platform. They are very similar, policy wise, to Margret Thatcher. Socially, they are supportive of the status quo in Poland (conservative), and economically free market.

L&J are socially more conservative than Platform but, economically and socially, they see a big role for the state. There has even been talk of re-nationalisations. They believe in high state spending, not too many free market reforms, a slow down in privatizations…and they hate a man that is one of Thatcher’s free market idols in central Europe, LesZek (shock therapy) BalcerowicZ.

So all in all, I would say that ‘left-conservative’ is an accurate description.

What L&J really are, is right wing populists. Law and Order, rabid social conservatism, but high involvement of the state in the economy, in a Keynesian manner, establishing a safety net etc. This is a hallmark of all "national unity" style governments. Right wing populism is in fact the essence of Fascism, with the only difference being that society is not fully militarized.

Such a state of things was in the logic of things for all post soviet countries. The working class was fucked, so it has become disaffected. It has no political culture of its own, due to Stalinism and thus cannot engage in independent political action. The petty bourgeoisie, or middle class if you prefer, mostly hailing from the old bureaucratic strata, sees that the new state of things is not after all that good. They didn't get to become oligarchs, and they also don't get their Party perks.

No, you are not getting it. It's different here.It’s all abort two things: the 1980s Solidarity movement; and Polish catholic ideology.

The Solidarity trade union was based on several different political factions. But most agreed in collectivist (Left) solutions. Law and Justice come out of the more fundamentalist faction of Solidarity.

Secondly, Polish catholic thought is based around the idea of ‘social solidarity’. Look at John Paul II. He hated atheist communism, but equally despised capitalism.

And those two ideologies makes up Law and Justice. They are not ‘rightwing’ in the sense that you understand in the west. In fact, the language that you understand politics in Scotland does not apply to countries like Poland at all.. Things are different here.

I would also suggest that the language that you talk about politics does not make any sense in the west either, these days….things have changed. Wake up and smell the coffee (or some other fashionable phrase that I am sure I am using incorrectly).

The working class was fucked, so it has become disaffected. It has no political culture of its own, <><

This kind of ideological perspective explains exactly why the left is fucked. Purporting to champion the working class and act as it's vanguard, they dismiss the working class as vapid, incapable of developing a political culture. What the too much of the left doesn't realize is that the working class wants nothing to do with vanguard theorists/activists of any kind. Yea, right, I forgot.... false consciousness, blaah blaah woof grrk puke.

they dismiss the working class as vapid, incapable of developing a political culture

False. The working class in Eastern Europe has no political culture not because it lacks a vanguard, but because it was "vanguarded" so to speak by Stalinism, which is exactly what you describe. For decades there were no democratic structures, no independent trade unions, not even a free approach to the study of Marxsism. This is why, faced with "shock therapy" the working class in Russia could not defend itself. Can you imagine something like happening in a country like Greece or France?

I suggest you read up on Luxemburg's theories of spontaneity and on Bordiga's conception of party-class relations.

If the working class was only capable of trade union consciousness, then there would not be any radical socialist parties. This is of course patently false. "Trade union consciousness" was used by Lenin to describe the level of development of the working class in Russia in the 1900s, which being in its infancy, did not have a political culture of its own, nothing more, nothing less.

I've just about had it with this "OMG AUTHORITARIAN LENINISTS, RUN AWAAAAAY!" reaction I get from anarchists and assorted left liberals.

And those two ideologies makes up Law and Justice. They are not ‘rightwing’ in the sense that you understand in the west.

I am not using rightwing in an economistic term. Even in Britain, if you go further to the right than the tories, that is, to the BNP or the quasi Fascist organizations of Northern Ireland, you'll see that they espouse an ideology of social responsibility and collectivism. This is not an anomaly, collectivism is the social ideology of fascism, just like individualism is the social ideology of liberalism. In Greece too, LAOS (Popural Orthodoxy Rally) a group that split from the right wing of the Greek Tories is also "collectivist". They talk about state responsibility, reducing unemployment, a "national economy", a brotherhood of Greeks etc. This is the same platform that all right wing populists campaign on. Due to particular historical circumstances, they happen to be in power in Poland at this time. This however does not change their nature.

I think your mistake is in associating "nationalizations" and "collectivism" with the left. Firstly, collectivism is as I said earlier a fascist, rather than a socialist ideology. Secondly, nationalizations happened under Hitler's government too. This is of course due to the middle class social basis of fascism. The small businessmen etc, are threatened on the one hand by large capital, and on the other by any resurgence of socialism. However, unlike workers and capitalists, they do not have enough power to pursue their political demands (no access to the state apparatus and closing down their chip shops is not going to do much harm to the economy). They thus have to mobilize the working class by appealing to their concerns. If you watch "This is England" a brilliant film about Skinhead culture, you'll understand exactly what I am talking about. A group of otherwise very honest people turn to fascism and racism because of their grievances with the Thatcher government.

As for whether things have changed or not, I do not dispute that there have been large scale changes in their manifestations and appearance. What has not change is the essence, or the content if you will. Of course we have to come up with new concepts to deal with new phenomena (the information age for one) but the relevance of the materialist conception of history remains as strong as ever. What the left has been guilty of is that it has tried to force current events into the boxes of old conclusions, drawn from past analysis, of past situations. Whether those where correct or incorrect at that time is irrelevant to their usefulness today, which is small. This tendency is largely due to the isolation of Marxist sects from practical life (which as their favourite Trotsky said, is worth a thousand times as much as theory). Feuerbach, while an excellent philosopher in his early life (Marx thought that he should pursue his studies with him) fell into an insurmountable mountain of thought contradictions as soon as he moved to live in an isolated country house.

This dogmatic approach to Marxism is not something new. The conclusions (form) of Marxism have often been confused with its method (essence). This has led to the left often holding to outdated ideas as if they were core principles. It happened with the 2nd International and it is now happening with Trotskyists of all shades. The Marxists however who understood the Hegelian spirit of Marxism railed against dogmatism in the same way I (and many others) rail against it today. About 25% of the content of my blog is bashing the dogmatism of the left as you have probably noticed. At any rate, I think I am rambling. Here's a good text on dogmatism:

Thanks. I enjoyed that. Luxemburg's theories, as you no doubt well know, were always well-recieved in Poland. May I also suggest you read up on Avakian's theories... Celebrate Socialist Albania! Long live the SDKPIL!

As for Lenin, he was very correct on Luxemburg's misplaced internationalism. On matters of organization, they were pretty much arguing over semantics. They were both right and they were both wrong for different reasons, the most important one being the different level of development of the working class in Germany and Russia

Yeah, but I am cause that is what confuses people when talking about a ‘left/right wing’ Polish political party. Because the language don’t fit here.

And ‘collectivism’ is important because, again, this is a specific trait of politics here, different from the west (and so is the excessive individualism that is a reaction to it – again all very Polish.).

The working class in Eastern Europe has no political culture not because it lacks a vanguard, but because it was "vanguarded" so to speak by Stalinism, which is exactly what you describe.

The traditional form of the political culture of the working class in have been the trade unions. However, the communists have subverted this concept by mandating the communist unions which were assiociated with the communist state -- and thus effectively unable to defend the workers against the employer, i.e. the state. (To their credit, the communists did in fact very much improve the working conditions and social care for the working class).

So the Solidarity was formed as an independent trade union, which would defend the workers from the state. Do you know the original 21 postulates, of the Gdansk strike in 1980? I mean, read them. 19 of them relate to social matters! The two remaining are: acceptance of free trade unions and guaranteeing freedom of speach. There is nothing there about introducing democracy. Nada, nicht, zilch. (You'd think there is something about it there, would you? After all this is what the contemporary propaganda says!) The original Solidarity was representing the working class interest.

What happened next: after the 1980 came the martial law, and Jaruzelski deported many of the Solidarity operatives abroad. Curiously, the people who remained where the ones from the KOR group --- Kuroń, Michnik et.al -- and KOR was after the political things. So the KOR group took over the trade union and turned it into a political party. (There is a conspiracy theory that the KOR people struck a deal with the communists, so they were not deported, only the leaders of the other fraction). And thus the Solidarity under the KOR management brought us the Round Table talks and the free elections in 1989. But this management did not care about the working class, although the working class did not know that yet; people still believed the Solidarity represents them.

So, the Solidarity gets to power in 1989 and... breaks up. And then a coalition of post-Solidarity parties forms a government, which introduces Balcerowicz's reform. And that reform screws the working class. Royally. Up the ass.

So, the working class has been left without a political represenstation and with a great distrust towards politics that lasts until today.

The classic rightwing, conservative party in Poland is Civic Platform.

ROTFLMAO, as they say in the chatrooms. The Civic Platform should be named the Crook Party.

You see, when the Balcerowicz reform came, there was a lot of good business to be made. Like, FOREX speculation based on insider information because Balcerowicz devaluated złoty and fixed the exchange rate. Or, buying for X złoty a privatized company which had X złoty in cash reserves. Or, getting Y złoty of credit in bank B, and then buying bank B for Y złoty from the state. Etc.

And such swindles were perpetrated mainly by the people who belonged to certain two political parties, which also formed the government at the time. These were named UD and KLD. They have later fused into something called UW, which later broke up into PD, and, wait for it... PO! And, certain stars of the transformation swindle (like this guy, who sold to American a modern cellulose factory for 142 million USD, and then gave the buyer 142 million USD in tax breaks) are still they high-ranking politicians of the PO.

Right wing parties are socially conservative, while PO is socially progressive (concerning abortion, gay rights etc. -- ever seen a right wing politician on a gay march?).

Conservatism has always been about decreasing taxes, state influence, simplifying the law and supporting the business, but when the PO people were in power they were raising taxes, regulating new industries, introducing complicated tax code and cooling the economy, thus killing many companies (oh, yes, they were supporting businesses -- these of their fellow crooks, that is). Except that they were doing all that under the UD/UW banner.

One of the reasons of the Kaczynskis' and Lepper's rise to power was their promise to investigate the frauds perpetuated in the 1990s under the now-PO politicians.

Opamp, this was a very informative posts. I can't read Polish however s I would appreciate it if you would find me a link of the demands in English.

beet.

I think you are looking at isolated incidents rather than the general trend. Overall, class struggle has been getting more acute. The fall in support for the radical left in France (negligible for LCR) has been largely due to their own mistakes, rather than a lack of support for their ideas amongst the working class. LO has been notoriously sectarian and the CP is generally disoriented as with most Eurocommies that have participated in bourgeois government coalitions.

In Italy, the PRC has thousands of members but is now facing internal difficulties because again of its participation in government. Joining coalitions is the death knell for most socialist parties.

In Greece, the Communist Party (the only remaining unreformed Communist Party in Europe) has been steadily growing since the 90s.

Overall, the left is in a rather better position than it was in the mid nineties. The success of the SSP in 2003 and the growth of regroupment projects, as well as the fact that the Bolivarian process in Venezuela is rapidly developing into a socialist revolution are all ample evidence of that.

Any failure to connect with the working class is solely the fault of the left itself as the large bourgeois parties' support is bleeding and the kitsch middle class guilt alternative groups (greens etc) don't seem to be cutting it either.

Level of class struggle? In better shape? I reckon we must be living on different planets.

Collectively, in the UK, the working class movement finished with the defeat of the miners strike in 1984. By the turn of the 1990s, that old type of proletarian politics was completely finished, not just in UK but pretty much everywhere. That includes the developing world. What were secular Arab nationalist movements (ba’athist types) are now Islamic. The secular left option failed, has nothing to sustain it ideologically elsewhere, and is not coming back.

In this part of the world the last victory by the organized working class was Solidarnosc. And then the w/c ate itself.

In the west left wing politics has turned into a bunch of tree huggers who keep going on about their carbon footprint.

Yup. For two reasons. The first one is that there is no working class anymore, because the everyone in the working class is now indirectly also a capitalist, because his retirement money is usually invested on a stock market by his pension fund (or insurance company or whatever). Thus, ironically, maintaining of capitalism is in the working class' best interest.

The other one is that the left wing parties have marginalized themselves, because after getting all the possible privileges for workers they forgot about them and started looking after women rights, gay rights, immigrant rights, and recently also animal rights, tree rights and whatever-have-you rights. And while you could build a sizable electorate out of women, immigrants or gays, it becomes more difficult with animals and trees. So they are naturally becoming irrelevant.

And in the mean time, workers' rights are being infringed on again, since there is no-one to defend them, because the people that should be are too busy hugging trees.

How? Has the working class disappeared? As long as there is a working class, there will be a workers' movement at varying levels of power and development.

Did you miss the defeat of CPE legislation? Have you not noticed the drive for the establishment of a United Socialist Party in Venezuela and Chavez's calls to the workers to "read Trotsky"? What about APPO in Mexico?

The defeat of the secular left in the Middle East is of course unfortunate (although it has been making tentative steps towards rebirth in Iraq particularly) but it was simply a temporary defeat in the class struggle. Class struggle doesn't stop unless one of the two, or both classes are destroyed. Now, I think workers still exist.

The working class only exists if it is aware that it exists in the way that you mean. But it doesn’t. And if the class struggle always existed then why did they only start talking about it in the way you do in the mid 1800s? And why don’t they talk about it today the same way as they did in the 1970s (because they do not)?

You are being..what’s that word …oh, yeah – ahistorical. Big crime for a Marxist to be ahistorical. You used to get a few years in a gulag for that one.

(As you can see only first 4 are strictly political in nature, although some claim that 7 of them had political impact. I incorrectly stated there were only 2 political postulates; still the social ones are more numerous any way).

The working class only exists if it is aware that it exists in the way that you mean.

That's a rather idealist way of looking a things. A flame can burn you whether you are aware of its existence or not. The level of consciousness amongst the working class doesn't change the objective fact of its existence. Consciousness is largely contingent on the acuteness of class struggle and of course, the information war.

And if the class struggle always existed then why did they only start talking about it in the way you do in the mid 1800s?

The class struggle hasn't always existed. It has existed for as long as classes have existed. Just as the earth hasn't always revolved around the sun, but it has been revolving around the sun ever since this solar system came into existence.

As for why they didn't start talking about it until the 1800s, I think that's a bit of a weak argument against its validity. Hooke didn't discover cells until the 17th century. Does that mean that organisms were made of something else before then?

And why don’t they talk about it today the same way as they did in the 1970s (because they do not)?

I dont feel spineless because I know I am not. And if you knew the circumstances of each signing, and why it was signed, then you might be in a position to understand enough to judge. But you are not. So you can't.

Sometimes I think that the Kaczynski's are performance art geniuses (and not bad politicians after all).

They've managed to make signing their stupid little lustration into an crisis of conscience for many people who never worked with the secret servicesIt's all rather similar to that felt by many who were enticed / intimidated into working with the secret police in the first place.